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On the campaign trail and in nearly a dozen media interviews, U.S. Rep. Jacky Rosen, D-Nev., has regularly touted her efforts to build a business after moving to Southern Nevada in 1980.

Yet a Reno Gazette Journal review of public records found no evidence that Rosen held a state or local business license for the software consulting shop she’s referenced in interviews with C-SPAN, NBC Reno and other media outlets.

Rosen — a Chicago native and political newcomer looking to flip one of the country’s most coveted U.S. Senate seats — ran the unnamed, one-woman operation between 1993 and 2002, according to her campaign.

The business served two main clients, Southwest Gas, Rosen’s former employer, and Radiology Specialists, the Las Vegas-based physician group where Rosen’s husband was a partner.

Southwest Gas confirmed Rosen worked for the company as a programmer from April 1990 to January 1991. A spokeswoman said she could not prove that the first-term congresswoman consulted for Southwest because the company does not keep "non-pipeline" contracts beyond seven years.

Radiology Specialists, Rosen’s other main consulting client, could not be reached.

State officials said that prior to 2003, the former computer programmer would not have been required to seek a state license for her Henderson-based consultancy, provided she didn't hire any employees.

But officials in Rosen's adopted home of Henderson said she would've needed a local license to operate a for-profit business within city limits. David Cherry, a city spokesman, added that a city policy requires business records to be destroyed one year after a business closes or one year from when a license is not renewed.

In a statement to the RGJ, Rosen's campaign said the candidate believed the proper paperwork was filed in Henderson, but that it was hard to know for certain because she "did not keep these kinds of forms from roughly two decades ago."

“Jacky built a career as a computer programmer and software developer for major companies in Southern Nevada, and she used those tech skills to keep working as an independent consultant," said campaign spokesman Stewart Boss. "Like many moms, she wanted to continue her career in business while also having more flexible hours so she could also focus on raising her daughter.”

Rosen's congressional financial disclosures list a self-employment retirement account, valued at less than $15,000, among her assets. A campaign aide said that account dates back to 1998, when she was still working as a consultant.

Rosen did not personally respond to the RGJ's questions and did not provide documentation of her past consulting work. Her campaign said that work included an update to Southwest Gas' customer service support software and a new billing system for Radiology Specialists.

‘Built a business’

For many pundits, political observers and voters, Rosen remains a bit of an unknown.

The 60-year-old former synagogue president had zero political experience at the time Harry Reid, the former U.S. Senate majority leader, tapped her to run for the U.S. House seat vacated by Republican Joe Heck in 2016.

Eight months after narrowly topping perennial GOP candidate Danny Tarkanian to take that post, Rosen announced her bid to unseat Heller — hurling herself into a race that sits at the very core of Democratic efforts to retake the Senate.

Even Reid, Rosen’s biggest political patron, has acknowledged her newcomer status, telling colleagues in a November 2016 speech from the Senate floor that the candidate “didn’t have a really long resume, other than being a wonderful person who had a great family and was involved in community activities.”

Rosen has rarely missed a chance to rattle off her resume on the campaign trail, introducing sometimes unfamiliar audiences to past experiences as a waitress, computer programmer, mother and family caretaker.

Interviews with several media outlets show the candidate has also underscored efforts to build a business, often without elaborating on the nature of that work.

The Las Vegas Review-Journal, New York Times, RGJ and Yahoo News have all made brief, undetailed mentions of Rosen’s past career as a consultant. In April 2017, Rosen told C-SPAN she “raised a family, built a business,” and “took care of my parents and in-laws as they aged.” The Nevada Appeal added to that account in August, when the paper reported Rosen had built a business as a software designer.

“Like I said, I’ve raised my family, I built a business – a woman in technology,” she said in a November interview with KRNV, the NBC affiliate in Reno. “Look, you’re having a technology boom up here in Northern Nevada. I think it’s fantastic. I want to promote those STEM opportunities so that we can continue to grow across the state that way.”

Candidate biographies — from Ballotpedia to the official congressional directory — also tout Rosen as a business owner.

Familiar questions

Rosen isn't the first Senate front-runner to face scrutiny over past business filings.

Her top election opponent, U.S. Sen. Dean Heller, R-Nev., in February said he didn't need the state's OK to sell hay out of his 180-acre farm in Smith Valley.

Heller — who oversaw business filings as Nevada’s secretary of state between 1995 and 2007 — explained that's because the farm is a household business that has never turned a profit.

Still, the politically vulnerable GOP senator filed for, and received, a business license on Feb. 5, the same day the RGJ first asked state officials about his business credentials.

Heller spokeswoman Megan Taylor said that in obtaining the license, Heller and his wife Lynne “went the extra mile — even though they were not legally required to do so.”

The hay farm, purchased from a Heller campaign donor in 2010, generated at least $169,000 in total income between 2011 and 2016, according to U.S. Senate financial disclosures.

State officials in February did not take a position on whether Heller should’ve sought a business license, adding only that the Secretary of State’s office “does not make a determination of when an entity is conducting business in Nevada.” That determination is made by the person conducting the business, said office spokeswoman Jennifer Russell.

She offered a similar rationale when asked about Rosen’s business, pointing a reporter toward the state law governing business filings before referring further questions to the Nevada Department of Taxation, which handled state business registrations prior to 2009.

“We have no way of knowing what type of business her consulting business was,” Russell said. “We are not even sure if the requirements were the same before this came under SOS. You need to ask taxation.”

Stephanie Klapstein, a spokeswoman for the state taxation office, said Rosen would not have needed a state license so long as she didn't hire any employees.